Friday, January 16, 2015

Death of a Ghost Hunter

***DISCLAIMER***
The following review is entirely my opinion. If you comment (which I
encourage you to do) be respectful. If you don't agree with my opinion,
that's fine. To each their own. These reviews are not meant to be
statements of facts or endorsements, I am just sharing my opinions and
my perspective when watching the film and is not meant to reflect how
these films should be viewed. Finally, the reviews are given on a
scale of 0-5. 0, of course, being unwatchable. 1, being terrible. 2,
being not great. 3, being okay. 4, being great and 5, being epic! And
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the occasional live-Tweet session of the movie I'm watching! Even though the ghost hunter lived a rich, fascinating life, we're just going to focus on the death.Death of a Ghost Hunter – 0 out of 5

One thing I love more than a great horror film that actually
scares the crap out of me is a really bad horror film that makes me laugh.I’m not entirely sure how I stumbled upon
Death of a Ghost Hunter—most likely Netflix recommended it to me (and I
recommend that Netflix cuts a check because I once again dropped their
name…someday they’ll pay me).Whatever
the reason for finding this film, I’m glad I found it because it is all kinds
of bad…and that made it hilarious to watch.

More horror films need people just standing and staring off into the distance in the middle of the day.

Years after a grisly murder/suicide took place in an
assuming home, the current owner decides to enlist the help of ghost hunter
Carter Simms (Patti Tindall) and have her investigate the home for proof of a
haunting.Simms, normally used to
working alone, is surprised to find the owner has also enlisted the help of a
friend/videographer (Mike Marsh) and a journalist (Davina Joy).The entire group, however, is shocked to
suddenly find themselves greeted by a member of the local church (Lindsay Page)
who is around to defend the good name of the mother that is accused of
killing her entire family and, subsequently, causing the home's haunting.The investigation quickly starts to pay off
as Simms finds cold spots and the cameras capture spectral images.Ultimately, however, none of the crew is
ready to find out the horrifying truth of the home’s past.

﻿

The Live Strong bracelet to the cop's character.

﻿

Death of a Ghost Hunter is low budget…really, really, really
low budget.Like so low budget that
films made by high school students and uploaded to YouTube look like big budget
masterpieces.Death of a Ghost Hunter’s
budget is so low that it makes every college student’s final assignment for the
semester look like it was produced by a collection of major studios and Warren
Buffett.However, having little money
for a film doesn’t necessarily make it good or bad.A film can have a credit card with an unlimited
spending limit and still church out generic bull-poo or a film can have a
shoe-string budget that is barely larger than the final amount of feeding 10
people at Taco Bell and still toss out something special and entertaining.Sadly, DoaGH doesn’t throw out magic…it farts
out something far, far less.

This is really the only fart scare this film was able to squeeze out...which is why they made it the movie's poster, I guess.

The story isn’t really anything special.It looks really no different than other films
investigating hauntings and the cause of the hauntings is unnervingly
cliché.However, I knew exactly what I
was getting into with this film but this movie actually could have been
unique.The film has an element to its
story where the journalist asks Simms about getting proof of an afterlife and
how that is pretty much the white whale of the ghost hunter’s life.Simms explains that everyone eventually
learns the truth and this kinda/sorta comes into play at the end but in a very
lazy, just sorta thrown out there way.There was no impact or profound punch in the face when this element
comes back into play.The problem with
this is the fact this film is way, way too painfully predictable.

For example, I quickly guess that this object was a crucifix and a holy symbolof the Christian religion. Too easy, movie. Too easy.

DoaGH really wants to think of itself as a shocker film that
delivers a twist ending but the problem is the film is way too obvious with the
direction it is going.A certain character
that is introduced to the film has an important role with the family that is
haunting the team and the end reveal is treated as a “A-HA!” moment but the
moment ends up being a “Yeah, I already knew this was coming” moment due to the
plot being less than subtle with its clues.Hell, the plot pretty much explains it to you the second the character
makes their appearance.

This picture is in no way a spoiler. In absolutely no way.

This desire to have a twist ending plays at odds with the
rest of the film because it is so worried about making this lackluster “shock”
ending that the rest of the story, mainly the fate of ghost hunter Simms that
is given away in the title, takes a backseat.This forces the story to cram in all the horror (well, as horror as this
film gets), murder, and character conflict with Simms into the last Act of the
film.This makes the film feel like it
has no idea what it wants to do with itself or the direction it wants its story
to travel.Additionally, this ends up
making the film have no freakin’ clue on when to end.By my count, this movie had three endings and
none of them were satisfying in any way.We have to get the “shocker” part, Simms' conclusion (and the whole point
of the story until the writers decided to change that midway through the script),
and the fate of the house…which is somehow explained to be one of the most
haunted places in the world that is so strong in evil that no religious
denomination has been able to cleanse it.Which, in and of itself, is pretty laughable.Places with far darker pasts are somehow
being beaten in the haunting game by a suburban home that had only a handful of
deaths?I understand the concept of
aiming for the stars but this film was overselling itself bad.

"Hmmm...it's called 'Two Girls, One Cup.' It must have something to do with thishaunting..."

The problems this film has doesn’t stop at just the story,
pretty much every aspect of this film is failing at what it should
accomplish.The edit is really the only
thing in this film that is horrifying.Scenes will go on far, far too long to the point of tedium and the point
that you just no longer care about what is happening.Additionally, shots will suddenly insert
themselves into a scene before cutting away back to the first shot.For example, we’ll have a medium shot of a
few players and suddenly, for a brief time period (usually less than a second),
a close up or another shot of another character will suddenly pop up and
disappear as the edit goes back to the medium shot.It’s very disorienting and an obvious sign of
a complete lack of experience with editing. There's no rhyme or reason to these chaotic chops and it creates a progression that has no natural beat.
Along with the obvious filters thrown in for some shots and sequences, it easily made
me realize this whole film was edited on a cheap, off-the-shelf editing program
that was, most likely, run by someone with very little editing experience.I don’t know this for a fact, mind you, but
the final product is all but spelling this potential reality out.

That is quite an effect...I swear, I am riveted by this film's use of cheap editingsoftware.

Then there is the camera work.I don’t know if the film was trying to be a
“found footage” film or was the camera operators just unable to hold the camera
still for a single second?

Not kidding here, this scene is just the ghost hunter standing around for about a minute and a half. I'm assuming she was trying to find the tension and chillsthat somehow escaped set.

Night-vision doesn't not make a movie scarier...you need the actual scares to go with it.

Finally, this film has some truly awful acting.Bad acting is almost a given on low budget
films because the production can’t afford the good actors (there is a reason
they make more money than what I’m worth as a human being) and why the director
often casts themselves, family members, friends, or the pizza delivery guy who
just so happen to wonder on set with what passes for the Kraft Food Services
lunch.Usually when I watch a low budget
film, I am forgiving of the bad acting because I realize they couldn’t afford
better (and sometimes you can find a really good actor hidden among the rougher
edges of the acting pool) but this one had no saving graces.I don’t know if it was the fact that the
journalist actress couldn’t deliver a single believable line or the fact that
almost 90% of the lines begin with the actors saying “Um” or the painfully bad
oversell they did with all non-verbal reactions but all the actors were really
wooden and wholly unbelievable.

Well...at least she made turning the lights on convincing.

I usually try to find something good in almost everything I
review but the only thing I can think of with Death of a Ghost Hunter is that
the film could have held a decent story if it actually went with the story the title
promised and didn’t try and shoe-horn in a lame faux-twist ending and, in doing so, the film
might have worked.If the film feathered
out there characters and realize the story needed to be about Simms
investigating the haunting, her fate might have meant something and the story
could probably have been interesting and had the potential to have some scares
but, as it is with its awful acting, dismal story, and nails-on-a-chalkboard
style acting, the film is a horror film without the scares and a film without
any reason to not hit the stop button on your DVD player and absolutely no
reason to not put you into a deep slumber.

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About Me

I'm a geek, an atheist (who is also an ordained reverend), a peanut butter and jelly enthusiast, a man who shares the same name with a popular character from "Parks & Rec" and feels he can't live up to the awesomeness of the fictional character, was proudly banned from Reddit, an occasional Shakespearean performer, and a stand up comic.
Have any questions, recommendations or wanna share any theories on various movies? Email me at RevRonMovies@gmail.com and I'll talk about them on my new Q&A segment!